Forum:Standard 'template' for weapons pages
We should really come up with a standard sort of template for weapon pages. For one thing, we definitely need to cut back on the amount of pictures of a weapon. I think we should have one Weapon Infobox with a picture and the stats filled out (as a range). After that, I think no more than one additional picture. So maybe we can have picture in the infobox be a weapon with the highest stats. Then have an additional small box with only a picture of the lowest level picture we can find. Also, the weapon infobox's stats aren't very helpful. At least the damage portion isn't, as damage changes a LOT based on level. Usually with the unique weapons, the accuracy tends to stay within a small percentage range, and the same goes for the rate of fire and magazine. Back to the weapon template... The first thing on a page should be a brief description of the weapon's common stats, like "This sniper generally has a high accuracy and rate of fire," or thing to that effect. Another section would be the location of where the weapon is a known drop or reward. "Location: Reaver's Edge is always and only found when dropped by Reaver. Watch out, because he will use it in the fight against you." There should also be a section for effects. This will list the red special effect text, and a description of what it does. :-Special Effects- :*''Pele Demands a sacrifice!''- Causes splash fire damage. :*High Accuracy - Generally above 96% :*Slow RoF - less than 1 *etc" There can of course be more sections, these are just a few I've thought of right here. Does anyone else agree that we should have a standard template? And thought on the 2 picture limit? Changing infoboxes? -Zaybertamer 00:11, November 6, 2009 (UTC) ---- Agreed. Regarding the images I'd say the vast majority of the camera-at-the TV shots can be the first to go. PC users can get better screen grabs and save in .png format for the inventory graphic images that people tend to use. I see the light on the "one additional image" suggestion, although I can think of two additional image possibilities to consider. The first person view might be appropriate and also the third person view (if captured in multiplayer) of the character holding the weapon. Certainly, all of the repetitions of the inventory graphic are redundant. -- WarBlade 00:24, November 6, 2009 (UTC) ---- Oh yeah, sorry xbox/ps3'ers, but the TV shots are terrible and need to go. I'll have to start saving my screenshots as png's with transparency too. As for the view pictures - even the same model of gun can have multiple appearances. Take a look at the Maliwan Volcano page: the snipers all have the same shape, but different parts. One of them has a large silencer-type thing on the end of the barrel, and others don't. So as cool as it would be, it doesn't make much sense unless there is a gun that really looks unique like the alien weapons - those can have a wielding screenshot. I made a new page how I think they should be - S&S Crux. Perfect picture (Photoshop's magic wand tool rocks!) and clean layout. Anything else that should be on there? -Zaybertamer 01:30, November 6, 2009 (UTC) ---- I don't think we need to have more than two images, one for the weapon infobox and one for the article itself. The infobox one can be the weapon card, while the article could have one of a character holding the weapon in-game. If there are multiple variants, you could create a MNG file of the weapon cards, which is basically like an animated GIF file, but using PNG instead. Pdboddy 13:09, November 6, 2009 (UTC) :As I mentioned above, even weapons the unique weapons (with a common name portion, and base effects) can have very different appearances. It still chooses different weapon parts to put together to make the final model, so a picture of appearance is fairly useless, in my opinion. An animated image to show different models sounds nice, but not everyone knows how to make them (myself included), and people will end up throwing additional pictures on the page until we have 5 pictures on the page because people want their model added to the MNG because it is worth $200 more than usual. I would keep it on the table for a second image. Or we could have a gallery of thumbnails on the bottom of the page, but I'm not sure how easy it is to do on wikis (I'm new to editing wikis =) ). -Zaybertamer 22:56, November 6, 2009 (UTC) ---- I agree that the TV screenshots do need to go, but I was thinking that if people are really insistent on wanting to have an image of every weapon variety, perhaps we could create a separate Gallery page for each weapon. Keep only 2 images of the weapon on the main page so it doesn't load slowly. Then make a gallery of all the other images so the people who do want to see them could go there and know that it'll be a slow loading page. Just an idea I had, you can run with it or not. It's all good. Wagnike2 13:18, November 6, 2009 (UTC) : I think the Pestilent Defiler page is a good example. And the size of the actual image isn't an issue, except for file storage space. Make a template infobox (like the weapon infoboxes) that forces a specific sized thumbnail. That'll keep the pageloads quick and snappy. Pdboddy 16:36, November 6, 2009 (UTC) :: I really think that that page looks awesome. I'm throwing myself behind this idea/format. Wagnike2 17:14, November 6, 2009 (UTC) : It seems to me that the pestilent defiler is just a randomly generated revolver with the 'Give Sick' effect. If that is so, we don't need to list every possible thing it could have. It is similar to The Dove. This is an interesting case, as it is a randomized quest reward. Its a pretty messy page, but appears to have a few variants. If the Pestilent Defender is like this, then sure, a table/list would be a nice way to list possible models. If it is as randomly generated as other weapons, then we're better off not listing all the possibles, and just what is common. :As I just typed above, a gallery does seem like it could work. Ooh, maybe we could have a section on the page called gallery, which loads when you expand it. This is a table filled with thumbnails. I think wikis have some kind of functionality like that, but I'm not sure. -Zaybertamer 22:56, November 6, 2009 (UTC) ---- I had an idea yesterday, and after sleeping on it, I thought I'd throw it out to you folks. What about creating a separate wikia for just the guns/equipment. Call it Marcus's Munitions. Tagline: Enough Borderlands guns to choke Skagzilla. Come up with spiffy templates and guidelines (like no creating a page if you don't have the screenshot to go with it), and unleash it upon the masses. Pdboddy 16:39, November 6, 2009 (UTC) :: I'm going to be honest that I don't really like this idea. I prefer to keep all the Borderlands information in one source. Sorry if that offends you, but hopefully not. Wagnike2 17:14, November 6, 2009 (UTC) ::: Hah, if that offended me, I'd need to get a thicker skin. :P The thing is, unless you're showing every last single gun, you're not showing all the Borderlands information, now are you? :P But doing all those guns would detract from the fine work people are already doing here. From the reading I have been doing, a compromise is being worked on, which will probably not include many of the guns. By separating such things (and by no means does this mean you cannot show the elite/unique/purple+ weapons here) you make it so this wikia doesn't get bogged down, while expectations for the Borderlands Gun wikia would be to expect only the guns and nothing but the guns. :I'm with Wagnike2 on this one, all the borderlands info should be on one wiki. We definitely don't need every weapon, and people will still probably create random weapons here anyways. Shoving the weapons to another wiki, still has the issue of trying to make pages for 17 million (i think that was the number) weapons, which is ridiculous. -Zaybertamer 22:56, November 6, 2009 (UTC) ---- I agree with you, in the long run. However, I've found the screenshots useful for validating various info posted by users on the Eridian weapons pages, and for finding patterns once there's enough data. Once we've got all of the variations down, I definitely agree that anything after the first screenshot should go. --Lagged 17:46, November 6, 2009 (UTC) :I didn't think of screenshots being used for verification, but that is a fair reason. It still would be bad to have pages edited to add a picture, but I suppose links to the picture on an external site (to save file space) like tinypic, would be good, or using the gallery. I'm really down with this gallery idea, and I think I'm going to try and look for it implemented somewhere. -Zaybertamer 22:56, November 6, 2009 (UTC) ----